This is the story of Patient Zero of the Reflections. Get ready, because this is going to play with your perception every time you pass a mirror today.
It started with a one-millisecond delay.
I was in the bathroom, brushing my teeth, when I noticed my reflection spit out the water an instant after I did. It was so fast I brushed it off as a trick of the light or simple exhaustion. But then it happened again while I was combing my hair: I had already lowered my hand, but my image in the glass was still finishing the motion.
I began to stare at mirrors with obsession. And the lag increased.
Two milliseconds. Ten. A full second.
Last night, the true horror began. I walked into my bedroom and passed the wardrobe mirror. The reflection didn't move. It stayed there, standing still, staring at the spot where I had been a moment before. Then, with agonizing slowness, it turned its head toward me.
It wasn't reflecting. It was watching.
I tried to cover every mirror in the house with bedsheets, but that's worse. I can hear fingers scratching against the glass behind the fabric. I hear the sound of my own breath bouncing off the covered surfaces, but with a different rhythm—as if the "me" on the other side is trying to make up for lost time.
This morning, I made the final mistake. I looked at the dark screen of my smartphone.
The reflection in the black screen isn't lagging. It's ahead. It showed me bringing a hand to my throat, terrified. I didn't want to do it; I tried to keep my hands in my pockets, but my muscles began to move on their own, obeying the image on the screen.
Right now, I am typing this message. But on the phone screen, I see that my reflection has already stopped writing. He has put the phone down. He has picked up a kitchen knife. And he is beginning to smile in a way my lips have never learned how to do.
I can't stop. My hands are performing the movements he has already completed.